Day: October 12, 2007

“Barry George, the man serving a life sentence for the murder of television presenter Jill Dando, has demanded a new legal team three weeks before a second appeal against his conviction is due to begin.”

“The fact that claims brought against a number of defendants had different legal bases did not preclude application of the provision in art 6(1) of Regulation 44/2001 (the successor to the Brussels Convention of 1968) that in certain circumstances multiple defendants could be sued in the courts of the domicile of any of them.”

“An uncontested order for shared residence made by consent by a judge in family proceedings was not determinative of the issue whether it was reasonable to expect the children whose residence was the subject of the order to live with the parent in whose favour it was made.”

“Where the court was exercising its discretion under s 610(2) of the Housing Act 1985 to decide whether to vary a restrictive covenant to permit conversion of a single dwelling house into flats where planning permission had been granted there was no presumption, let alone duty, in favour of varying the covenant. It was left to the court to take account of all relevant factors and to carry out a balancing exercise, giving such weight as it judged appropriate to the various factors in the exercise of its discretion.”

“An agreement whereby a wife waived her entitlement to periodical payments from her former husband under an order of court on the promise of her former husband to leave her £100,000 in his will was legally effective even though it had not been approved by the court.”

“In considering an allegation of breach of a registered Community Design, the court should adopt the standpoint of an ‘informed user’ who was more familiar than the average consumer with design issues. Rather than relying on expert evidence, the court should look closely at the registered design and the allegedly infringing article and ask whether it produced a different overall impression.”

“Beresfords, a tiny firm of solicitors in Doncaster, has received £123m from the taxpayer by winning compensation claims on behalf of coal miners for work-related diseases, new government figures show.”

“Gordon Brown’s efforts to protect Britain’s opt-outs on the new EU treaty at next week’s summit in Lisbon came under fresh pressure yesterday when a Labour-dominated committee of MPs claimed the latest draft of the treaty presented fresh threats to British sovereignty.”